Region added 4,000 jobs over year, but will it cut jobless rate?

The Capital Region added 5,900 private-sector jobs in the year to November, the state Labor Department reported Thursday. That’s nearly half the 13,000 net private-sector job gain for all metropolitan areas upstate. But a loss of 1,900 public-sector jobs over the same period reduced the overall gain to 4,000 jobs. Public school districts had 700 fewer employees than a year earlier, according to the figures.

Whether the job gains will do anything to lower the unemployment rate wasn’t clear. The Labor Department will release metropolitan area unemployment rates for November next Thursday.

But the unemployment rates the department did release on Thursday showed mixed improvement. The statewide rate declined to 8.3 percent from 8.7 percent in October, although it was still higher than the 8.2 percent rate a year ago.

New York state, outside New York City, had a 7.9 percent jobless rate, down from 8.2 percent in October but up from 7.5 percent in November 2011. The rates are adjusted to take account of seasonal variations.

And the number of people employed in November in the Capital Region stood at 445,700, well below the October peak of 455,900 reached in 2007.

“Retail trade remained one of the areas of weakness,” said state labor markets analyst James Ross. Despite the Christmas shopping season, there were 1,100 fewer retail workers in November than last year at this time. Ross attributed the decline to a number of factors, including more online shopping and a reduction in employees at big-box retailers.

Another soft spot was leisure and hospitality, with 700 fewer workers than last year.

But manufacturing employment was strong, with a gain of 1,600 jobs. The 23,400 people employed in manufacturing was the highest number for November in six years.

And those numbers could continue to grow.

“We’ve kind of been assuming that long term, manufacturing jobs would continue to decline,” Ross said. But a boom in domestic natural gas production has pushed prices lower, making the United States more attractive to industries that use a lot of energy.